Category Archives: Literature

We can now hold conversations with these abbreviations, shortened for convenience, but are they stifling expression and limiting the exchange of thoughts, ideas, and opinions as Newspeak does? Newspeak, the new language developed by the totalitarian government in 1984 written by George Orwell, is not the only parallel between the fiction and real worlds; the Urban dictionary is the Newspeak dictionary; Siri and other devices that transform our words into text is speakwrite.

So, what is keeping our world from completely transforming into that from 1984? For one, here in the land of the free and home of the brave, our freedom of speech is protected by the First Amendment. Of course there are limitations to what the First Amendment protects, but we do not have to worry about the death penalty for keeping a diary, or watch what we say when we are in front of the TV screen. We should be using our rights to the fullest extent, conversing in much more complex dialogue, making it more difficult for a totalitarian rule to take over.

Like this:

“Your presentation MUST be memorable.” That one sentence with the bolded “must” was from the instructions for the Frankenstein project for the 1st semester English final, and it was the first thing my eyes zeroed on.

Usually in an AP class, students go out of their way to impress the teachers, going beyond the requirements of the assignment. However, when the instruction requires you to make your presentation memorable, how do you achieve past that? Continue reading Do’s and Don’ts of a Presentation→